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Whistleblower: Keystone XL pipeline not safe – Lincoln (Neb.) Journal Star, Dec. 31, 2011

By Larry Winslow · Comments (0)

Wednesday, January 4th, 2012

http://journalstar.com/news/opinion/editorial/columnists/mike-klink-keystone-xl-pipeline-not-safe/article_4b713d36-42fc-5065-a370-f7b371cb1ece.html#ixzz1iVp5EpZH

By Mike Klink

There has been a lot of talk about the safety of the proposed Keystone XL pipeline.

I am not an environmentalist, but as a civil engineer and an inspector for TransCanada during the construction of the first Keystone pipeline, I’ve had an uncomfortable front-row seat to the disaster that Keystone XL could bring about all along its pathway.

Despite its boosters’ advertising, this project is not about jobs or energy security. It is about money. And whenever my former employer Bechtel, working on behalf of TransCanada, had to choose between safety and saving money, they chose to save money.

As an inspector, my job was to monitor the construction of the first Keystone pipeline. I oversaw construction at the pump stations that have been such a problem on that line, which has already spilled more than a dozen times. I am coming forward because my kids encouraged me to tell the truth about what was done and covered up.

When I last raised concerns about corners being cut, I lost my job — but people along the Keystone XL pathway have a lot more to lose if this project moves forward with the same shoddy work.

What did I see? Cheap foreign steel that cracked when workers tried to weld it, foundations for pump stations that you would never consider using in your own home, fudged safety tests, Bechtel staffers explaining away leaks during pressure tests as “not too bad,” shortcuts on the steel and rebar that are essential for safe pipeline operation and siting of facilities on completely inappropriate spots like wetlands.

I shared these concerns with my bosses, who communicated them to the bigwigs at TransCanada, but nothing changed. TransCanada didn’t appear to care. That is why I was not surprised to hear about the big spill in Ludden, N.D., where a 60-foot plume of crude spewed tens of thousands of gallons of toxic tar sands oil and fouled neighboring fields.

TransCanada says that the performance has been OK. Fourteen spills is not so bad. And that the pump stations don’t really count. That is all bunk. This thing shouldn’t be leaking like a sieve in its first year — what do you think happens decades from now after moving billions of barrels of the most corrosive oil on the planet?

Let’s be clear — I am an engineer; I am not telling you we shouldn’t build pipelines. We just should not build this one.

Pipelines can and do stand the test of time, but TransCanada already has shown that they cannot. After working on engineering projects all over the world, I can tell you that a company that cared about safety would not follow these types of practices.

If it were a car, the first Keystone would be a lemon. And it would be far worse to double down on a proven loser with Keystone XL.

The stories of how TransCanada has bullied landowners in Nebraska rings true to me. I am living it, as well. After repeatedly telling the contractor and TransCanada about my concerns, I lost my job.

But I couldn’t watch silently as a company put innocent people at risk with a haphazardly built pipeline. I am speaking out on behalf of my children and your children.

Oil spills are no joke. We need to do all we can to protect our water and our food. I am glad the Nebraska Legislature stepped up to protect Nebraskans. I can only hope that they stand up to TransCanada. We should all take a hard look at the damage that this pipeline will do. I should know; I’ve seen it in person.

Please do not sell out to foreign oil and foreign suppliers. There is no guarantee the product will stay in the United States, only the toxic waste. God bless the United States and those of us who still believe in the fact that her people matter.

Mike Klink of Auburn, Ind.., is seeking whistleblower protection from the U.S. Department of Labor.

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Categories : Landowner Rights, Legislature, Pipeline

Northern Plains releases 2011 Legislative Scorecard – May 20, 2011

By Larry Winslow · Comments (0)

Friday, May 20th, 2011

By Northern Plains Resource Council

Northern Plains Resource Council, a grassroots conservation and family agriculture group, released its Legislative Scorecard for the 62nd Legislature this week. The session was characterized by numerous attacks on state protections for land and water, attacks on the participation of citizens, attacks on the rights of landowners, and even a proposal to weaken Montanans’ constitutional right to a clean and healthful environment.

Northern Plains is perennially an active participant in legislative sessions; its members across the state follow the session closely, and many of them even travel to Helena to participate as citizen lobbyists.

“Instead of working to create jobs in Montana, the majority party and Governor granted unprecedented power to large corporations, padding their bottom line at the expense of the state’s family farmers and ranchers and other Montanans who hunt and fish or otherwise care about the health of our land and water.” said Ed Gulick, Chair of Northern Plains. Agriculture remains the state’s number one industry.

The 2011 legislature continued more than a decade of attacks on the state’s cornerstone environmental law, the Montana Environmental Policy Act, and it passed a bill authorizing private for-profit corporations to use the state’s eminent domain power to condemn private property. These changes shut landowners and other Montana citizens out of the public process concerning future development in rural Montana.

At the same time, Northern Plains applauded legislators who worked to defend the state’s growing renewable energy economy.

“Energy efficiency and renewable energy development, such as wind and solar, are still a viable industry in Montana that will create jobs despite attempts to undermine them,” Gulick added. “Our constitutional right to ‘a clean and healthful environment’ is still intact, 700 pounds of mercury a year will not be released into our air by coal-fired power plants, and a Governor’s veto maintained the twice voter-approved ban on cyanide heap-leach mining.”

Expanded use of renewable energy will boost investment in the state, deliver millions in local tax revenue to rural counties, create good family-wage jobs, and provide clean, affordable power to Montana consumers. Numerous measures were introduced to weaken the state’s renewable energy standard or otherwise obstruct renewable energy, but all were killed in the legislature or by gubernatorial veto.

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Categories : Agriculture, Clean Energy, Clean Water, Coal, Fossil Fuels, Landowner Rights, Legislature, News, Northern Plains Resource Council, Pipeline

Guest column: Legislature’s attacks on renewable energy unprecedented and misguided – Bozeman Daily Chronicle, May 5, 2011

By Larry Winslow · Comments (0)

Monday, May 9th, 2011

http://www.bozemandailychronicle.com/opinions/article_63cc0c52-774f-11e0-9201-001cc4c03286.html

By Conor Darby

As the 2011 legislative session winds down, let’s take a moment to reflect on the Montana Legislature’s renewable energy record.

The foundation of Montana’s renewable energy policy was built gradually over the past seven legislative sessions. For more than a decade, Montana’s elected representatives have recognized the benefits of clean, renewable energy and have adopted policies to support it. Highlights include the net metering law, which allows Montanans to connect their small-scale renewable energy systems to the electric grid and receive credit on their utility bill for the excess energy they produce (adopted in 1999); renewable energy tax credits and loans (adopted in 2001); and the Renewable Energy Standard, which requires utilities to obtain 15 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by 2015 (adopted in 2005).

Given the state’s record of support for renewable energy, it came as a shock that the 2011 Legislature was so intent on stripping back the progress made over the last seven sessions. The plethora of anti-renewable energy bills at the Capitol this winter seemed designed to stunt the growth of one of the most promising economic opportunities available to Montana.

For example, several bills were introduced to weaken or repeal the Renewable Energy Standard, including two that were passed by both houses of the Legislature: Senate Bill 109 (sponsored by Sen. Debby Barrett, R-Dillon) and Senate Bill 330 (sponsored by Sen. Edward Walker, R-Billings). Sincere thanks are due to Gov. Schweitzer for standing up for energy independence and clean energy jobs by vetoing these two regressive bills.

Senate Bill 226 (sponsored by Sen. Jason Priest, R-Red Lodge) would have turned back the clock on the progress Montana has made supporting small-scale, customer-owned renewable energy. SB 226 was passed by the Senate but finally defeated by a bipartisan majority of the House Federal Relations, Energy, and Telecommunications Committee. We all owe thanks to the hundreds of Montanans who contacted their legislators or testified at the hearing, and to the committee members who had the wisdom to vote down SB 226.

Another anti-renewable energy bill, Senate Bill 253 (sponsored by Sen. Bob Lake, R-Hamilton), would repeal all state tax credits for renewable energy and energy conservation. These tax credits are popular and widely used: tens of thousands of Montana families – most of them low- to middle-income – utilize them each year, and are enjoying warmer homes and lower energy bills as a result. These tax credits have also meant that window dealers, insulation installers, heating contractors, and renewable energy businesses all over the state have seen additional business in this down economy. Unfortunately, a majority of legislators chose to ignore the importance of these tax credits, forcing renewable energy advocates to seek yet another veto from the governor.

Make no mistake: Attacks on renewable energy are attacks on Montana’s energy security, independence, and good jobs. Local renewable energy decreases our dependence on energy imports from unstable regions of the world, reduces our vulnerability to the volatile prices and finite supply of fossil fuels, and helps our state meet the ever-increasing demand for energy. And it creates jobs and stimulates economic development throughout Montana – supposedly, the Legislature’s primary goal this session.

Let’s take a moment at the end of the 2011 legislative session to thank the many Montanans who spoke out against the Legislature’s attacks on renewable energy; the legislators who stood up for renewable energy in the face of political pressure; and Gov. Schweitzer, for vetoing the anti-renewable energy bills that reached his desk. And next election season, when you hear candidates promising job creation and a new energy future, ask them the tough questions. What kind of jobs? How many? What infrastructure will be required? How much of the revenue will stay in state? What are the true costs to Montana of the energy sources being promoted?

Montanans want clean energy – in a recent Lee Newspapers poll, 62 percent of Montanans expressed support for state efforts to encourage renewable energy. Let’s send the signal early and often and hold our officials accountable at the polls.

Conor Darby is general manager of Independent Power Systems in Bozeman and president of the Montana Renewable Energy Association.

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Categories : Clean Energy, Guest Editorial, Legislature, News

Northern Plains sees chance for Governor to protect clean water, and clean air, May 1, 2011

By Larry Winslow · Comments (0)

Sunday, May 1st, 2011

Northern Plains press release

Northern Plains Resource Council, a conservation and family agriculture group, was generally disappointed with the outcome of the 2011 legislature.

“Our members understand that Montanans’ long-term health and prosperity depend on sound land stewardship, protecting of our water quality, and supporting family farms and ranches,” said Ed Gulick, Chair of Northern Plains. “Clearly the majority of the 2011 Legislature does not understand that.

“This session was marked by corporate giveaways, bailouts, and attempts to keep citizens shut out of the decision-making process at every turn.”

Some of the outcomes of bills Northern Plains opposed include the trampling of landowner rights through eminent domain, in which members of both parties and the Governor elected to grant large corporations the power of condemnation over farmers, ranchers and other landowners. Also, in the session’s waning hours, the legislature and Governor cut state and local taxes for underground coal mining companies, thus shifting the burden of school funding and public services onto the state’s agricultural and rural residents.

However, Northern Plains was pleased that some of legislation it opposed didn’t make it into law. Northern Plains members were a steady presence in Helena, working hard to ensure basic safeguards remained intact.

Although the legislative session has ended, there still is a chance for the Governor to prevent further erosion of citizen participation and environmental quality. He will be responding to a number of legislative proposals in the days to come.

“We ask the Governor to veto Senate Bill 233, which guts the Montana Environmental Policy Act,” Gulick said. “We want to preserve citizen input in the review of health, cultural, and environmental implications of proposed major industrial projects in the state.”

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Categories : Clean Energy, Clean Water, Legislature, News, Northern Plains Resource Council

Eminent domain: a power that should be wielded rarely and with care – Montana Farmers Union

By Larry Winslow · Comments (0)

Monday, April 18th, 2011

KUFM Public Radio Commentary
By Sandy Courtnage
February 8, 2011

It has been said that politics can make for strange bed-fellows. Watchers of the 62^nd Montana Legislature certainly can attest to that.

A perfect example is a recent hearing on expanding the powers of eminent domain to a private company from Canada. Individuals and groups that typically wear their private property advocate credentials as a badge of honor, were notably absent or they lined up on the “jobs & economic development” side of the discussion during the hearing on House Bill 198.

This bill is a specific legislative response to the ruling by a Glacier County District Judge who determined that the private Canadian company, MATL, did not have the right to condemn property. MATL, which is the acronym for Montana-Alberta Tie Line, is part of a Toronto-based company that is trying to build a 214-mile private electrical transmission line from Lethbridge, Alberta, to Great Falls.

HB 198 provides a “fix” to that court ruling. It allows companies that receive permits under the Major Facility Siting Act, to take private land for their use, and the bill’s implementation is retroactive to specifically benefit the MATL project.

However, that fix opens the floodgates to other foreign or domestic companies and perhaps could even see one neighbor pitted against another using the same supporting arguments that were offered to justify HB 198. Many bill opponents from the Townsend area, for example, testified to their concern that the bill will allow the proposed MISTI line the same powers.

Historically, Montana has been very reluctant to allow condemnation of private property for economic development. A well-publicized situation in Connecticut in 2005 used eminent domain power to condemn low-income urban businesses and housing to make way for economic development and high-end business. In 2007 the Montana Legislature passed a law to prevent condemnation for urban development.

Unfortunately, HB 198 proposes to treat rural landowners differently than their urban counterparts. This bill expands current eminent domain powers saying that the state will allow the taking of private property from one person or business to give to another person or business.

It should be noted that landowners along the proposed line mostly have supported the project. One landowner who went to court to protest the taking of his property testified at the legislative hearing for HB 198 that he was not opposed to the development. His family welcomes the production and development of alternative energy sources that create jobs and increase the tax base. But, he does oppose placement of the line on one particular piece of his property that contains wet lands, areas of historic significance and of biological diversity.

The landowner’s attorney has said that “…MATL can still do what it always should have done: treat landowners fairly and negotiate to reach an agreement about compensation and placement of the electrical line on their private property. If a private entity, such as MATL, has condemnation authority, it has every incentive to forgo civil, fair negotiations and to instead jump to the threat of eminent domain in order to speed up the process.”

Another affected landowner wrote in the Great Falls Tribune that he was told he “should take one for the team.” His response is that his family – like many other rural families – has provided easements and property for county roads, electric cooperatives, rural water districts, a public library, rural telephone cooperatives, fiber optic lines, gas and oil lines and the Western Area Power Association. “I have lots of team spirit,” was his reply.

He would just like this private, merchant transmission line company to take the time and effort to arrive at a business arrangement with the affected landowners. He believes the company simply wants to get its way without sharing any of the profits with the impacted landowners. His bottom line: “This is not about need: it is about greed.”

There is cruel irony to this bill. With all the posturing and testimony about the need for economic development, HB 198 will create very few jobs. The state’s Environmental Impact Study for the transmission line stated that the expected benefit of the long-term employment on the line would be “minor.”

The attorney for landowners with property along the MATL, called the Committee’s 14:2 approval of the bill a “…sad day for Montana landowners.” We agree.

The provisions of HB 198 do serious harm to the rights of private property owners. While government entities are permitted to seize private property for public use via eminent domain, it is contrary to American values to seize property from one private owner and give to another private owner for so called economic development purposes.

We believe that eminent domain is a power that should be wielded rarely and with care.

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Categories : Landowner Rights, Legislature, News

Letter:Eminent domain law sets dangerous precedent – Montana Standard, Feb. 28

By Larry Winslow · Comments (0)

Thursday, March 31st, 2011

http://www.mtstandard.com/news/opinion/mailbag/article_01df1db6-4141-11e0-98d4-001cc4c002e0.html

This letter was written by members of the Northern Plains Pipeline Landowners Group, who lie in the path of TransCanada’s proposed Keystone XL tar sands pipeline and who could be threatened by eminent domain in the future.

The Montana House of Representatives recently voted to pass House Bill 198 onto the Senate, giving persons the right to use eminent domain to condemn private land once the person is granted a certificate under the Major Facilities Siting Act.

If the Senate allows this bill to become law, it set a dangerous precedent for the private property rights of all Montanans.

House Bill 198 would give the right of condemnation, without need for good-faith negotiations, to persons who will use the land they condemn to make a profit. Why should Montanan landowners have to subsidize these profits for other persons? The profits earned by these persons, who could be from another state or even country, will be exported from the state as surely as the energy that flows through their structures crossing Montana’s landscape!

Eminent domain should be a last resort, used by a governmental agency or a person only when negotiations with the owner of the desired property have broken down. The taking of property for an entity’s profit differs fundamentally from a governmental taking of property for the public’s use.

Senators, please vote against HB198 in the interest of Montanan landowners.

Sandy Barnick, Glendive
Don Brown, Fort Peck
Elner Eaton, Lindsay
Darrell Garoutte, Wolf Point
Tim Hess, Terry
Tom Reeves, Glendive
Chad Taylor, Wolf Point

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Categories : Agriculture, Clean Energy, Legislature, Letters, News, Northern Plains Resource Council, Pipeline

Archive for Legislature

Whistleblower: Keystone XL pipeline not safe – Lincoln (Neb.) Journal Star, Dec. 31, 2011

Northern Plains releases 2011 Legislative Scorecard – May 20, 2011

Guest column: Legislature’s attacks on renewable energy unprecedented and misguided – Bozeman Daily Chronicle, May 5, 2011

Northern Plains sees chance for Governor to protect clean water, and clean air, May 1, 2011

Eminent domain: a power that should be wielded rarely and with care – Montana Farmers Union

Letter:Eminent domain law sets dangerous precedent – Montana Standard, Feb. 28

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